On a July afternoon in Mossville, Louisiana, Adrian Mouton stood on the patch of land his family has tended for generations, feeling a strong sense of lineage and purpose. 

“My father was Edgar Mouton; he was a representative from Mossville for quite a while, as long as I can remember.” 

Now at nearly fifty, he has lived most of his life in Mossville, a historically Black community that was once a place of liberation, but is now fenced in by refineries and chemical plants. Mossville is surrounded by 14 different industrial facilities. However, the encroachment of one facility in particular is worrying to Mouton and other Mossville residents: Sasol’s Lake Charles Chemical Complex. 

“As long as I can remember, it’s always been a problem with the chemical industry in our area,” Mouton said. The taste of the tap water, the color of the sky after chemicals were released from the plants, the funerals. From his recollection, too many to count have passed away from illnesses that have been linked to exposure to toxins.

“Every single person that has lived here and that was fortunate enough to die, I don’t know, after being here for 40 or 30 plus years, all passed from cancer, all passed from disease, all passed from a lack of natural causes.”

The encroachment of the Sasol complex has been so severe that chemical facilities are now located where Mossville Elementary School once stood. This expansion further into the community exacerbates concerns about exposure to chemicals. This includes carcinogenic chemicals linked to a variety of severe and at times fatal health impacts. 

An Ecosystem Once Full of Life Now Poisoned by Industry

As a young boy in Mossville, Mouton would spend most of his days outdoors, interacting with different parts of the living ecosystem that surrounded him. His mother grew food in the soil behind the house where earthworms moved through the dirt, squirrels dug up tomatoes, and frogs croaked into the night. 

“Lightning bugs. When I was a kid, we used to catch them in jars. My sister used to catch the little honeybees in a jar. None of that exists anymore.” 

In the Mossville of today, basic routines now require extra caution for Mouton and his family. “I’m scared to drink water. I’m scared to take a shower in my own house without having to go spend $2,000 on a filtration unit.” Even bathing is a careful calculation. “I can’t wash my face without opening my eyes after I don’t wipe them, because my eyes will be bloodshot and feel like they’re on fire because of the chlorine in the water.”

What industry didn’t poison in Mossville, it emptied. Many residents accepted a buyout deal from Sasol in 2013, in which they purchased 600 properties from residents of communities close to the chemical complex. 

Investigations by the University Network for Human Rights later found that Sasol’s buyout offers to residents of Mossville, a predominantly Black community, were on average 45% lower than Sasol’s offers to residents of the neighboring area of Brentwood, a predominantly white community. They also found that many Black residents who accepted the buyout were worse off than before leaving Mossville. 

An Inter-Generational Dream Deferred

Mouton refused the buyout offer, as he felt that what Sasol offered him did not reflect the strong sense of legacy he felt for his land. The offer he received also did not reflect market worth and would have made it difficult for his family to find peace elsewhere. 

Some time ago, Mouton’s father had organized an appraisal of the family land and property. Eleven years after this original appraisal, Sasol arrived to conduct another, ahead of their buyout scheme in 2013. The appraisal organized by Sasol valued Mouton’s land and property at just $5000 USD higher than the previous appraisal. An increase of only $5000 USD would imply a significant loss against the rate of inflation for the family. 

“When they came across with that offering, it really felt bullied,” Mouton reflected. “It really felt like a threat. This is what we’re offering, and you take it or leave it.”

Mouton thought that after rejecting the proposal, he could continue with his life in Mossville, trying to live as normally as he could among the toxic fumes. However, the buyouts and departures created a new problem for him: dozens of vacant lots and empty public spaces now dominate the town. “My closest neighbor used to be 20 yards. Now it’s 200 yards.” 

A Different Future for Mouton and His Family

This inter-generational, once unbreakable bond with Mossville was tainted by the displacement of a vibrant community by industry. Now, Mouton feels that Sasol has left him with no choice but to rebuild elsewhere. He now wants to convince Sasol to come back to the negotiation table so that the remaining residents can leave their community with enough money to safely relocate. 

“I’d like to get out. I mean, I really would, because, like I said, there’s no stopping them. There’s no stopping them,” he reflected with melancholy for the place that was once so treasured to him and his father. 

What he wants, ultimately, is simple: certainty for his children and grandchildren. He wants to pass down to them what his father left to him. A hope for freedom, stability, and safety that owning a piece of land provides to a family with hopes and dreams for a better future. He now believes that the best way to do so would be to leave Mossville with a fair deal and a fresh start.  

Mouton will never forget that his father taught him to treat land as a promise and a duty to be passed down from one generation to another. 

“I’m really a proud child of his fight for Mossville.” Even if he leaves Mossville, Mouton will always carry this legacy in his heart, a living testament to his community’s resilience and his inter-generational struggle.